Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Pit Bull Kills Baby By Ripping Open Skull, Parents Charged

Starting point is 00:00:00 Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. The evidence will show in this case that the mother and the father knew that this was a vicious dog. They had other dogs. There's some evidence that they may have mistreated these dogs in a way that would make them more violent. A six-month-old baby boy dies after police say the family's pit bull attacked and killed him. Now his parents are behind bars and they're facing serious criminal charges. I have the sad case out of Ohio.

Starting point is 00:00:43 Welcome to Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. And just before I start, I want to remind you that we are now on Spotify. You can listen to us and watch us there. So please check us out and follow us there. Little Royal Bates was an adorable six month old baby boy. There are photos of him online and he is absolutely precious. But sadly, Royal would not live longer than those short six months. Royal died on April 28, 2024, when a dog owned by his parents attacked him and killed him. This happened in Marion, Ohio, which is about 50 miles north of the state's capital, Columbus. Marion police were called to the family home that day in April of 2024 after the family dog, Kilo, attacked Royal. The assistant prosecutor on the case will be here in a short time to discuss this horribly sad case.

Starting point is 00:01:34 It was just after 10 a.m. last April when prosecutors say this dog, Kilo, attacked Royal as his older sibling, but still very young sibling, watched him. Royal rolled off the couch and Kilo still very young sibling, watched him. Royal rolled off the couch and Kilo attacked him, ripping open his skull. A police dispatch report shows how terrifying that 911 call was. Royal's mother placed the call. At 1048, the dispatcher wrote, Dog attacked her child, followed by juvenile head laceration and CPR in progress. At 10.50, the dispatcher wrote, caller is hysterical. One minute later, the dispatcher wrote about Royal, he is breathing, but turning blue, and dog is contained, followed by there on the front porch, dog is pet.

Starting point is 00:02:21 The case is an absolute tragedy. There was nothing, nothing that could be done to save Royal. In his obituary, the baby's family wrote that his favorite toy was a little round near, and he was very particular about having the correct binky. He loved his big sister, and he always woke up with a smile. A photo on Facebook showed that Royal's parents, Blake Bates and Alyssa Smith, celebrated his first birthday at his grave with his older sister. Now, while all of this was going on, the prosecutor's office was still investigating to determine whether what happened to Royal was a crime. Royal's parents, Blake Bates and Alyssa Smith, were charged with several felonies and a misdemeanor. Both are in the local jail. The indictment charges them

Starting point is 00:03:06 with two separate counts of involuntary manslaughter, reckless homicide, felony endangering children, and a misdemeanor count of endangering children nearly a year after Royal's death. Marion County Prosecutor Ray Grogan issued a statement that reads, parents have a fundamental duty to ensure the safety of their children, and leaving a helpless baby in such a vulnerable situation is utterly inexcusable. The presence of a known dangerous dog in a home with small children demands vigilant oversight and responsible parenting. This case starkly reminds us of the tragic consequences that can arise from failing these responsibilities. Both Bates and Smith appeared

Starting point is 00:03:46 in court on Monday for their first appearances. This is just the type of case that makes you wonder how much you know about the people living in your neighborhood. And that's why Truthfinder.com is such a great resource. Truthfinder is one of the largest public record search services out there. I searched for Blake Bates and his name came back with some traffic cases. The case involving his son's death, it's not showing up just yet. Truthfinder is really great because it will show you a person's past and current addresses, phone numbers, social media accounts, and of course, criminal and traffic records if they exist. If you want to try Truthfinder, you can get a really great deal. You can get 50% off of confidential background reports.

Starting point is 00:04:25 Just log on to www.truthfinder.com slash lccrimefix. Log on and start accessing information about almost anyone. So I want to bring in Mark Weaver. He is serving as a special prosecutor on this case. Mark, talk to me a little bit about why it took so long or it feels like it took a while for charges to be filed in this case. I know sometimes with a grand jury, there's some investigation that goes on. And so it's taken almost a year, about a year for the couple in this case to be indicted. I often serve as a special prosecutor.

Starting point is 00:05:02 In this case, I'm a part-time assistant to Marion County Prosecutor Ray Grogan, and he and I are prosecuting this case together. We wanted to take the time to work up the backstory of this dog. Under Ohio law, it's easier to prove felony charges if you can show that, in this case, the mom and the dad of the baby who was mauled to death by the dog, had previous knowledge that the dog was vicious. And this requires law enforcement to talk to neighbors, some of whom have moved to other places, and get them to identify which dog might have been aggressive and vicious before, and then run down any ring doorbell camera or other evidence that would prove that. We also were talking to people in and around the family who'd be able to identify the history of this dog. It took a while, but just last week, the jury handed up indictments. And now we have

Starting point is 00:05:59 both the mother and father in custody for first degree felony charges. There's other charges as well, but the first degree felony is the most serious for this horrific mauling of this six month old little boy. And it's just, it is horrific. The dog's name is Kilo and the baby is Royal and he was six months old. I mean, he's a baby and he was left with a child to watch him so so talk to me about how this incident unfolded because you've got a dog who has a history and uh you know i you're you're the prosecutor you're one of the prosecutors on the case so talk to me about how this event unfolded. Yeah, of course, everyone is presumed innocent.

Starting point is 00:06:52 But the evidence will show in this case that the mother and the father knew that this was a vicious dog. They had other dogs. There's some evidence that they may have mistreated these dogs in a way that would make them more violent. There's going to even be evidence that others had said to them, careful, watch that dog around children, that you ought to know that that could be a danger to the child. And so the horrific facts about how this played out is that the mom and the dad are out of the room. The dad is somewhere outside. The mother

Starting point is 00:07:15 may have been taking a shower. And they left the six-month-old in the care of an eight-year-old child, the other child in the house. And somehow or way, the baby rolls off the couch. And that moment, the dog grasps and begins biting. This is horrible. The baby's head, the baby's skull. And it takes a while for when the adults are finally back in the room to get the dog off the baby. And of course, 911 was called and heroic efforts were made to save this baby's life. It did not succeed. And so as a result, they have been indicted for involuntary manslaughter and reckless homicide and other charges related to the fact that they should have been taking greater care to protect this vulnerable infant from, I'm not going to get

Starting point is 00:08:06 into the whole whether pit bulls as a species are worse than other species and other breeds of dogs. That's not our case. Our case is they had reason to know that this particular dog was vicious. You said that they took steps to make the dogs aggressive. Why? I mean, were these dogs that were involved in fighting? when they were fed, which is always going to make a dog more aggressive when you threaten the dog with whether it's going to be able to get food or not. There's some evidence that in the prior months, that particular dog had gone after a neighborhood child and people knew about that. The dog warden was called. That's evidence to show that you ought to know that this is a dog that shouldn't be

Starting point is 00:09:04 around children. We'll find out when we get the witnesses on the stand what the culture in this house was, but we do know that in other places around the country, there's a culture of, if I have a tough dog, that shows that I'm a tough person. I'm a tough guy. And the tougher the dog, the tougher I am. We'll see whether that evidence comes out in this case, but that's all too common in other cases of people who buy dogs not to be a companion, but to make a statement about how tough you are. So you don't know if the dog was involved in fighting, but you're thinking maybe this was to make a statement about, I'm a tough person, I have a tough dog?

Starting point is 00:09:46 We have no evidence of dog fighting. We have evidence of mistreatment of the dog. And we have evidence of other dogs of a similar breed being at that house. Only the people closest to these, husband and wife, will be able to tell us what the mentality of the owners was. Why would you want to have a pit bull? You could have had a poodle. You could have had a lab. Why a pit bull? The defendants don't have to testify. If they take the stand,

Starting point is 00:10:16 I'll be asking them why they chose this breed and why they treated this dog in a way that would make it more vicious. So it sounds like you have family members or friends of these people who've basically helped you out in this case. We do. The law enforcement has talked to friends and family and neighbors about this family, about this dog. It should be said that the father who was charged, Bates, he was already in custody. He had already been previously charged with domestic violence and an escape charge, trying to run away from that domestic violence case. And so when he was indicted by the grand jury, he was already in jail.

Starting point is 00:10:51 The mother, Smith, she was free and arrested last week and is now in custody on these charges. Where is Kilo now? The next day, the dog warden put this dog down. Any dog that would do what this dog did to this baby should not be around anybody anymore. And I prosecuted many cases, including death penalty cases, child rape, child porn, all sorts of violence. And the autopsy photos of this baby were one of the tougher images I've ever seen in 22 plus years prosecuting cases. What a dog with that strong a bite can do to the vulnerable little soft skull of an infant is just horribly upsetting. And so the evidence will be seen by the jury. They won't like it any more than I did. This is a very troubling situation. Now, this is not the same as somebody who's intending to

Starting point is 00:11:52 murder somebody. I don't mean to suggest that at all. I prosecuted people who purposely and intentionally killed somebody, and those folks deserve the death penalty or life in prison. But this is still a horrific act of certainly recklessness, maybe even other elements of mens rea that would show that this family should have known better than to have this dog around such a vulnerable infant. And I want to go back to, you know, Royal, the baby being left in the care of a child. I mean, how long was he left in the care of this child? I mean, because, I mean, it doesn't matter because it could be five minutes.

Starting point is 00:12:33 But I mean, was he left home alone with this child? Or what were the circumstances? The evidence the officers picked up when they got to the scene was that the father of the child was in the backyard and the mother and the child was in the bathroom, potentially taking a shower at the time. And that this all started in the living room where the eight-year-old was there, the only person to watch the six-month-old on a couch. And I remember when my daughter was six months old, maybe a little older than that. We had her somewhere and she started to roll. And then we realized she's not always going to stay put where you put her. As kids get older, they start to move. And so the evidence suggests that it was this rolling or this moving

Starting point is 00:13:15 that moved the child from the couch to the floor. And that was seen by the dog as some sort of opportunity to attack the child oh god um how horrible um so uh they are going to you know have their day in court obviously um but this is just a horrific case mark i mean an infant a six-month-old infant a baby killed by a dog i mean i i just can't even imagine uh the little girl though i mean i can't imagine that little girl and what she will have to live with for the rest of her life that memory this is sad for everybody and also it's not lost on me that these parents lost their baby and i'm sure they're grieving for that. But prosecutors, particularly the prosecutor I'm working with, Ray Grogan from Marion County, they have an obligation when they're put in office to send a message to people that when somebody breaks the law, they're going to be held

Starting point is 00:14:16 accountable. And in this case, the grand jury has brought down serious charges, first degree felony charges against these two. And holding them accountable for their crime is our primary goal, but it will be noticed by the community and a reminder that all of us are responsible for protecting the children in our care. Yeah, it's a horrible, horrible case. How much time in prison do they face if convicted? We have several charges. We have a first degree misdemeanor, three third degree misdemeanor. I'm sorry, first degree felony, three third degree felonies and one misdemeanor. Many of them would merge, which means their sentences would go together and the maximum will be about 16 years. Wow. Well, we will keep an eye on it to see how it turns out. But that poor little baby, it's just awful. Mark Weaver, thank you so much for talking with us about this case. I appreciate it. Thank you. I want to turn now to James Bogan. He is a defense attorney based in Ohio. So James,

Starting point is 00:15:17 if these cases or one of these cases lands in your lap as a defense attorney, I mean, how do you defend this case? Because from what we know, the facts seem pretty clear that a baby was left with an older sibling who was still a pretty young kid and that he ended up dead, attacked by a dog. Well, what you got to look at first, did this dog have a history of being aggressive?

Starting point is 00:15:46 Now, I've heard reports that this dog was being trained to be aggressive. But was this dog trained to be an attack based on certain argue that it would have killed the baby early on instead of wait six months in and would have, if the dog has no history of being aggressive, I think it would be harder for the state to argue that they were reckless in that regard. Well, the prosecutors say that there was one incident, another incident in the neighborhood involving this dog, and we're still trying to pin down all of the details about that. But an incident where this dog had done something to a child in the neighborhood. So we know that, at least according to the prosecution, that there was one other incident involving Kilo, this dog and another child. So, I mean, and they're claiming they have, you know,

Starting point is 00:17:03 family members and friends who are going to testify to certain facts regarding this dog and how the family kept this dog and even told them this is not a dog that should be around kids. Obviously, I'd need to know more about what these witnesses specifically say to be able to address that. But I mean, just be very blunt. If they're giving very explicit details about these owners doing things that they shouldn't be, then yeah, the defense is going to be in trouble here. But, you know, it's going to be all about what the specifics are. You know, it's a horrible case. I mean, you have obviously a mother and a father, Blake Bates and Alyssa Smith. I'm sure they were grieving. I mean, the mother, just according to what we saw on the police dispatch report, was hysterical. I can't imagine, you know, you leave the room to do whatever you're doing for a period of time and you come back and you see your baby in that condition, you know,

Starting point is 00:18:07 dying on the floor because your dog has attacked the baby. The dog was put down the next day by the Humane Society officials or the dog warden because you just can't have a dog doing that. But I'm sure they were grieving and, you know, no one could imagine, I'm sure. But they still, you know, they're responsible for the care of their child and ensuring that their child or children are in a safe environment. I mean, they can make sympathetic defendants, I'm sure, James. But at the same time, there's the other side of the coin that they are responsible for providing a safe environment for their children. Yeah. And what you have to look

Starting point is 00:18:51 at if you're the defense, you're going to have to really break down the specifics of that alleged incident in the neighborhood. What similarities were there? Was there something that set the dog off that you're not going to see in the home? That's something that wasn't normal. Obviously, I don't know the answer to that question. As far as the child endangering, courts have ruled any time versus if the dog has a history of aggressive behavior, which obviously I don't know the answer to the first about the first incident enough to be able to say if that's something they should have looked at and say, hey, you shouldn't have had this dog around kids or anyone. But I mean, this is a long list of charges. There are two different counts of involuntary manslaughter, plus the reckless homicide, plus child endangering.

Starting point is 00:19:51 There's a misdemeanor count of child endangering, plus the felony count. So, I mean, there are several charges here for a jury to consider. Yeah. And the involuntary manslaughter charges, each one in the reckless homicide, those are what you would call alternative charges where they'll charge the three different charges for the same act. So that if the jury decides, hey, the elements not met on this one charge, they've got this other charge or this other charge to look at. And the same idea with the child endangering, you have the both the felony and the misdeme the child endangering. You have both the felony and the misdemeanor child endangering. So those are alternative charges. So if they were found guilty on all the charges altogether, all the homicide charges would have to merge together. As in, you can't stack up the amount of time on each charge consecutively.

Starting point is 00:20:41 And each child endangering charge would have to be run concurrently with each other too. Now, as a defense attorney, one thing you'd be looking at, should any of the homicide charges have to run concurrently with the child endangering? Because you're basically charging from the same act, the same alleged act. Pretty interesting stuff. Well, they can post bail and get out, at least Alyssa Smith can at this point in time. Blake Bates, I don't know if he's going to be able to get out and be able to post bail. He's got other charges he's contending with too, including an escape charge on a totally separate case. But Alyssa Smith, she can post a surety bond and get out pending trial.

Starting point is 00:21:27 She has a daughter that she has to consider as well. So I'm sure as a defense attorney, your first thing is, I need to get my client out of jail so she can tend to her business and go to work and do things like that. Yeah. And see what else you can do as far as remedial measures too. That's always something you got to look at as a defense attorney. Even if you're thinking on one hand, hey, we're going to be gearing up for trial here. You always got to have one foot on the other side of the fence, playing the game, getting those remedial measures together. Just it's better to have them and not need them than vice versa. Yeah, most definitely. Well, we will be keeping an eye on this case. You know, I feel

Starting point is 00:22:11 like this is the second or third case I've seen recently where a parent has been charged after a dog attacked a child. So it's not something you see a whole lot. But James, it's been in the news in Ohio a little bit lately. Yeah. And I've heard about it over the years, too. I mean, I've seen cases over the years where it's a dog that's not a pit bull or a vicious dog attacking an infant. So, I mean, there is one on one hand, there is the other thing that the defense has to consider is a weakness of there's always that idea floating around of should you have any dogs around kids and so on. I mean, obviously, there's more detail to that idea, but that's something the defense is going to have to take a good hard look at and see how everything adds up. Yeah, definitely.

Starting point is 00:23:04 We're going to be keeping an eye on this case. It's just horrible. James Bogan, thank you so much. Thank you very much. Blake Bates' bail was set at $150,000 cash while Alyssa Smith is being held on a $50,000 bond. Both of them entered not guilty pleas to the charges. I reached out to Blake Bates' attorney for a comment. At the time of this recording, I had not received a response and will continue

Starting point is 00:23:29 to follow this case and bring you any new developments. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.

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Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Pit Bull Kills Baby By Ripping Open Skull, Parents Charged

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Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Pit Bull Kills Baby By Ripping Open Skull, Parents Charged

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